The success any sports teams can be significant influenced by one outstanding
player. This seems to be especially true of basketball, where one
particularly tall play can materially alter the effectiveness of a team.

At six feet eight inches, Art Spoelstra was the outstanding basketball
player at Godwin in the late 1940s and early 1950s. In a sport where height
clearly has advantages, he was one of a handful of players in the Grand
Rapids area with both the height and ability to help carry Godwin's basketball
team to great success.

Recent photograph of Art Spoelstra.

Thursday, 10 April 2008

Arthur C. Spoelstra Sr., 75, of Evansville, formerly of New York City, passed away Wednesday, April 9, 2008, at Select Specialty Hospital. He was born September 11, 1932, in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Arthur was a former NBA player and all American at Western Kentucky University, where he is in the Hall of Fame. He loved all sports and played a mean game of golf.
He recently retired as a union stagehand for many Broadway Theaters in New York City.

Private services will be held. For further details contact Alexander North Chapel.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Vanderburgh Humane Society, 400 Millner Industrial Drive, Evansville, IN 47710. Arrangements by Alexander North Chapel, 4200 Stringtown Road.

Published in the Courier Press on 4/10/2008.

From a piece in the Evansville Courier & Press, posted April 11, 2008:

Art Spoelstra never made more than $5,500 in an NBA career that began in
1954 with the Rochester Royals and ended when his knees gave out 17 games
into the 1957-58 season with the New York Knicks.

"The team flew into Fort Wayne one night in a snowstorm," his son Neal
recalled on Thursday. "There were no cabs and no buses. They didn't coddle
the players back then like they do now. You had a game the next night
hundreds of miles away and it was your job to be at the gym on time. One of
the players' brothers ended up piling all the players in his car and taking
them to the arena."

Left click on the image below for a larger version.

Courtesy the Spoelstra family An Art Spoelstra basketball card from when he
was with the Minnesota Lakers.

Irene, his fourth wife, met the 6-foot-9 professional basketball player at a
bar in New York City.

"I had brothers who were tall and I always wanted a tall man," she said. "We
started talking and I liked what he had to say. I asked him to marry me that
first night. I was 35. He was 40. Why waste time?"

Art Spoelstra died Wednesday after bouts with heart trouble, ulcers and
peritonitis. The Evansville man was 75.

The native of Grand Rapids, Mich., played at Western Kentucky University and
was drafted in the fourth round by the Royals. Usually a bench player, his
best season was the 1955-56 campaign when he averaged 8.5 points.

"After Art quit playing, he got in the insurance business," Irene Spoelstra
said, "but the white-collar world wasn't for him. He became a stagehand in
New York, joined the union and worked a number of Broadway plays. He was
good at it and got to know actors like Art Carney and Kevin Kline."

The 70-year-old woman, a New York native, said her late husband was "a
hard-headed Dutchman who had a temper. He could definitely tell you to stuff
it in your hat, but he was also very gregarious. If he was your friend, he
would do anything in the world for you. He loved dogs. If one died, he was
inconsolable."

She laughed.

"That man could party. He loved to have a good time. Art was also very
competitive at anything he did. Especially golf. He played a mean game."

Neal Spoelstra, 53, of Owensboro, Ky., never met his father until 25 years
ago.

"I was a child of his first marriage," said Neal. "Mom had custody and
didn't want him involved. One thing led to another and I asked some
relatives if they had his address. I found out later that Dad was trying to
locate me. It was like fate was trying to bring us together.

"I saw him for the first time at the Evansville airport. We hit it off great
and became very close."

Art and Irene Spoelstra moved to Evansville in the mid-1990s to be closer to
Neal. He worked at McDonald Golf Course until his health worsened.

"You had to be really tough to play basketball back when Dad did," Neal
Spoelstra said. "There wasn't any sitting out for a nagging injury. They'd
just shoot you full of pain killers and you'd get in the car for the long
haul to the next city. With his knees and everything, he paid mightily for
his NBA career."

The younger Spoelstra enjoyed watching games on television with his father.

"Dad didn't like the three-point shot and he didn't like the dunk. He said
he could throw the ball down when he was in the seventh grade, so what's the
big deal?

"It was like you shouldn't take that kind of shot because it was too easy."

Irene Spoelstra said it bothered her husband that the younger NBA players
had such little regard for the pioneers of the game.

"They have all the TV contracts and all the cash, but they've forgotten who
got it all started," she said.

No pension money came until last year.

"Art got a $30,000 lump-sum check and he was in line to get $1,000 a month,"
Irene Spoelstra said. "He looked at the piece of paper and kinda grunted and
said, 'About (expletive) time.' He knew players from his era who were on
welfare and living out of cabs. He couldn't understand why it took so long
for them to get a little money thrown their way."

Neal Spoelstra said his father came over "a little gruff, but he was really
just a big lug. Kids were afraid of him because he was so tall, but he
enjoyed giving them his old bubblegum basketball cards."

Art Spoelstra will be cremated today.

"I'm going to keep the ashes with me until the next time I go to New York
City," his wife said. "Then I'll put them in the Atlantic Ocean. I think Art
would like that."

School flag for wall mounting,
from the 1940's. ( Source: Lee Neugent, class of 1948. ) The animal looks
more like the neighbor's collie than a wolverine.

Left click on the image below for a larger one.

School flag about half the size of a wall mounted version. ( Provided for
scanning by Clarice (Wicks) Cox, class of 1953.

The image above is from about 1956. Clearly the distinction between
a wolf and a wolverine had been lost - what is shown is a wolf. Maybe the
influence of Frank Rackett's collection. See section "W" to see what a
wolverine looks like.

Godwin High School, My dear old Godwin,
Godwin High School we're all for you!
We will fight for your name and glory,
For the fame of the gold and blue
Ever daunted, we cannot falter
In the battle we're tried and true
Godwin High School, our dear old Godwin,
Godwin High School, We're all for you

The Indiana University Marching Hundred song "Indiana Fight," by
Leroy Hinkle, was apparently "borrowed" from the Godwin Marching Band.
It can be found on the Internet on an IU web page and/or can be ordered on
a CD of IU songs from the IU bookstore.
If you are set up to play AU, MPEG, or WAV files, check out
Indiana Fight!
in the "Recordings" area to hear this piece.

Daniel F. Douglass (Joe) played football at GHS,
graduated in 1948 and enlisted in the Air Force where he had basic training
in Texas and technical training in Illinois and was assigned to a Radio
Security Detachment at McClellan AFB in Sacramento, CA. While in the AF, he
attended Grant Technical College nights and was asked to join the football
team. The AF was happy to have him do this (good public relations). He
played a season there and was spotted by a scout (John Baker, the coach) from
the University of Denver and offered a scholarship to the U of D for the fall
of l952 (his 4 year enlistment was up in July). He played for DU as a center
for two seasons and after that, he concentrated solely on obtaining a
Bachelor Degree and also a Master's Degree from DU in 1956. In the late
1950s DU discontinued their football program.
( Text provided by Jane Hubbard Douglass, class of 1948. Photograph supplied
by Lee Neugent, class of 1948.)

Based on those identified in the photograph, it is believed that the event
is a basketball game in the physical education building in about 1960 or 1961.
Hopefully someone will one day come forward wit hmore information, but there is
not much to go on.

Some of the people identified in the photo are teacher Hilda MacGregor, bottom,
near the left. Above her is Mick Fitzgerald, class of 1962. Above left of her
is Emily Hylkema, class of 1961, and possibly Marian Bolthouse. Also spotted
are Marsha Welch, Laurie Kalkovan, Donna Schultz, Sue or Sandi DeCouix, Mr.
Ripmaster, Jan Vonk, Roy Chamberlain. Tom Noble and Jerry Bainbridge are in the
lower right corner.

Apparently the Godwin - East GR game of 1959 was to the class of 1959 what four
touchdowns in one game at Polk High was to Al Bundy. East Grand Rapids HS was well
endowed, and its sports teams would make it at least as far as money could provide.
But every now and then talent prevailed and schools like Godwin had their day in
the sun. Polly Goeman provides the courtside tallies, making it clear which
players carried Godwin to a victory over East Grand Rapids HS.